The nature of individual military careers were and are as varied as the men that have pursued them over the years. Some encompassed the entire adult life of a soldier other were very brief. Some were filled with glory, laurels and accolades and others completely uneventful.

Arthur Stanley Hoole was born at Downe, Kent, England in May 1866 to Stanley Hoole and the former Alice Mary Swan. Although nothing is known regarding the senior Hoole’s calling or trade the family was of some means since Arthur was enrolled at Uppingham School prior to leaving that establishment in December of 1880 and enrolling at the Royal Military Academy, Woolwich. Scholastically he must have been an above average student since his chosen branch of service was the Royal Artillery, a commission of Lieutenant in which he was granted on 29 April, 1885.

Hoole was stationed at Malta from 1885 to 1886. This was the extent of his overseas postings and he did not remain in the Army much longer – resigning his commission on 14 July, 1888.

Perhaps military life did not particularly suit Hoole but his relatively short stay in the Royal Artillery should not be seen to reflect any lack of ability or competence. The available information is rather sparse we can none the less see that Hoole had a distinct interest in science and letters. In 1905 he was elected as an Ordinary Fellow of the Royal Microscopial Society. Interestingly his mention in the Society’s journal lists him as Reverend Arthur Stanley Hoole. Apparently some time before this we was ordained as a Roman Catholic priest. Perhaps his desire to follow holy orders was a reason for his leaving the military since he was already listed as a Roman Catholic deacon at The Oratory, Kensington, London in the 1891 Census.

In 1906 we find Hoole mentioned in the prestigious medical journal The Lancet when is amongst the list of gentlemen who had passed the First Examination of the Board for Chemistry and Physics.

In the January 1913 issue of The Entomologist the Rev. Hoole is mentioned has having collected three examples – one possibly new to science - of the moth Hybernia aurantiaria on the Isle of Skye. This feat of daring do was described by Hoole in his own words in The Entomologist: “I took two fine specimens of H. aurantiaria in a lighted window here last month, and a third which I take to be a variety with ill-defined lines and considerable dark purplish speckling or clouding forming a band behind the second line.” His find was also mentioned in The Scottish Naturalist as well in at least one German scientific publication.

Unfortunately further mentions of Reverend Arthur Stanley Hoole are few and far between. He seems to have spent most of his life as a resident of London although he did taken one long ocean voyage to Australia in 1920 on board the SS Orvietoin the company of his younger brother George Stanley Hoole and George’s wife Maud.